Honorary Oscar to Poitier

Thesp won acting kudos for 'Lilies,' ' Defiant Ones'

HOLLYWOOD — Sidney Poitier — the only black actor to win an Academy Award in the leading male category — will be taking home another Oscar this year.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences’ board of governors has voted the 74-year-old multi-hyphenate as an honorary award recipient. He will be feted during the org’s 74th annual Academy Awards kudocast March 24.

Poitier is the first honorary recipient to be announced; as many as three other honorary nods could be presented.

“When the Academy honors Sidney Poitier, it honors itself even more,” Acad prexy Frank Pierson said Wednesday in making the announcement.

Poitier won an Oscar in 1963 for lead actor (“Lilies of the Field”) — he also nabbed a 1958 nomination for “The Defiant Ones.”

Nearly 40 years later, he is being handed a second statuette “for his extraordinary performances and unique presence on the screen, and for representing the motion picture industry with dignity, style and intelligence throughout the world.”